He sat still until a half naked man, who came backwards down the ladder, turned and confronted him with an apologetic smile. The fellow was old and his face was wrinkled and a curious yellow color. Marston had in Africa seen badly jaundiced white men look something like that, although the sickly tint was not so dark. A network of red veins covered his eyes but they looked as if they had been blue. His hair was all white. He put a small carved calabash on the table and then squatted on the cabin floor.
Marston frowned and waited. The carving had an African touch and it was an African custom for a visitor to bring a present. The negroes called it a dash.
"Cappy lib for village?" the mulatto remarked and Marston nodded.
He had not heard a canoe and wondered how the fellow got on board, since his thin cotton clothes were dry. Moreover, although the half-breeds Marston had met generally used creole French or uncouth Castilian, the other said lib for, like a West African.
"Bad country; white man sick too much. You sick now?" the mulatto resumed, glancing at the chest.
Marston made a sign of agreement. His head ached and he felt languid. It was possible he had a mild dose of fever.
"I fix you," said the mulatto, who pulled out a small brass box and emptied some brown powder on the table. "You drink him in hot water."
"Thank you," said Marston and scraped the stuff onto a piece of paper, thinking he might experiment with it. The fellow could have no object for trying to poison him and he understood the half-breeds knew some useful cures.
"Now you dash me a drink," said the other, looking at a bottle of whisky in the rack, and Marston rather wondered why he took down the bottle. The whisky was extra good; he did not like mulattoes, and knew no reason for his entertaining his uninvited guest. Yet he put a glass on the table; one glass.
He imagined the other understood the significance of this, for his eyes momentarily narrowed. It was strange, but they now looked blue. For all that, he poured out a liberal measure of whisky and drank slowly, like a connoisseur.